Song for a Timelord
by L. Harris
Summary: On the verge of regeneration, the Tenth Doctor finds he isn't alone. TenXRose, with spoilers for "End of Time." Visit my Teaspoon account at /viewuser.php?uid 12302 for more Who fic.


The song of the Ood pulsed through every sinew of his body. The Doctor could feel it vibrating in his bone marrow, creeping its way into his pounding hearts as he heaved himself into the TARDIS. Hard to remember that this pain was only temporary. Fire coursed through his veins and he wondered distantly if it would be enough to kill him. It could be too late for regeneration. He almost felt he could welcome death.

He staggered as a fresh surge of energy rocked his body. In the second of mind-numbing pain that brought him to his knees, images flickered across his mind. Donna's comical indignation when he asked her to be his new "mate." Martha, always rationalizing, wondering out loud how the TARDIS could be bigger on the inside. A sudden smack to his backside as Jack ("_Captain Jack_, thank you very much") slipped past him into the console room with a wink. Being knighted by Queen Victoria, fresh from defeating a werewolf, kneeling in Torchwood Manor next to a beaming, overall-clad Rose.

Rose…

His hands sought the console as he struggled back to consciousness. He had almost managed to bring himself to his feet when the panels beneath his fingers — no, the entire being of the TARDIS — began to blur. _Damn_, he spat, squeezing his eyes together and willing the room to refocus. But when they opened again, there was no TARDIS at all, only a bright light growing stronger and warmer with each passing second. And from that light a figure was emerging, and the Doctor wondered if this was what happened at the end of days. But was Death supposed to be beautiful?

The figure stepped closer, and as features became clearer the light became one with the person and he knew, he knew this must be death because it made sense that the last thing he would see would be —

"Rose!"

"Doctor."

Although her hand flew to her mouth to hide a gasp, he sensed that she wasn't as surprised as he was to be seeing her, here — wherever _here_ was. She looked every bit the flesh-and-blood girl (no, woman, he reminded himself) that he remembered, but surely, if he could just reach out, his hand would pass right through her. Because Rose was trapped on the alternate Earth, and there was no way that fate would be so kind or so cruel as to grant a Time Lord his dying wish.

"No sense asking how, I suppose," he mused, managing a half-smile that he thought must be at least vaguely convincing because the full-toothed grin that transformed her face was unmistakably relieved.

"Dunno," she admitted, shrugging sheepishly and brushing hair from her face. "Just… went to bed and felt this tuggin'. Thought it was mum, telling me I had to get up, but when I opened my eyes it was just light and a song." She looked uncomfortable as she blushed and admitted, "I'd follow that song to the ends of the universe, 'cause I knew it would bring me to you." The awkward, hesitating smile that twitched on her lips made him want to cry.

"So here you are."

"So here I am."

"Oh, Rose," he murmured, "when I lost you, I thought I'd never–." But whatever he thought, she would never know. A new, hot-white pain that felt like flesh being pulled from bone knocked his legs out from under him and the next moment he was doubled over on his side, gasping for what little air his burning lungs would allow. He tried to tell her to stay away, not to touch him during the regenerative cycle, but she shook her head and pressed cool hands to his face. When he was able to look, he was amazed to see her sitting beside him, unscathed. The golden glow parted where her skin touched his, the particles hovering around their connected bodies.

"Who'd've thought," he chuckled stiffly, sliding his body closer until his head rested in her lap, "always worried I'd outlive my human companions. Thought you'd go first, not the other way around. Arrogant Time Lord, eh? Just carrying on the tradition."

He almost smiled as Rose's eyebrow quirked but when she saw that, beneath the self-deprecating jibe, he was quite serious she bit her lip and shook her head fiercely.

"This isn't the end," she insisted, her voice hard with emotion. The eyes that looked down at him were shining with tears, but the spirit that spoke to him in hues of bright blue was not to be reckoned with. "There's so much good left for you to do, and you'll do it. Oh, yes," she pressed, sensing the rebuttal that even now was dying on his lips, "because you're brilliant, remember?"

"You forgot 'clever.'"

"Oy!" For a moment he thought she would smack him; her hand was poised above his chest, but when she saw the betraying twitch brought on by a new wave of pain from the changes that were even now being exacted on his anatomy, she placed that hand instead on his cheek.

"I'm so sorry, Rose," he managed, squeezing her free hand in his as he tried to say what had haunted him since that day at Dårlig Ulv Stranden. "When I said I'd never leave you, I meant it. Wanted it to be true, that you could stay with me. Turns out I was just being selfish. After the… after what happened in the Medusa Cascade, it seemed like the only thing to do. I wanted you to be happy, really, I did. But in the end it just… It wasn't the same," he choked.

Rose's face above his contorted as she tried not to cry. She had changed so much from the shop girl he had taken to the end of the world. He had always wanted to laugh at it, her cocky street-wise façade, because he knew that underneath she was just as sentimental as the next human. But it was more than that, of course. Rose was special. She had always been the one who reminded him when he had gone too far, when the Time Lord inside him forgot the worth of the little things that she never, never took for granted. He had promised himself he would never take _her_ for granted, but then he'd lost her and he'd wondered what good making promises was, anyway.

"I'm always here, you know," she said, her face closer than he could ever remember it being. She bent so that her head rested on his chest for a moment until the very proximity, the sheer closeness of _Rose_ made him gasp for breath. She sat back up, but her eyes were locked on his, bright and reassuring. "Part of me will always be around, no matter what."

As she brushed damp hair out of his eyes, an image flashed across his mind; slightly blurred but no less real, the memory of a golden angel stepping from the TARDIS. Rose, but not Rose: Bad Wolf destroying the Daleks and saving his life. She had looked into the heart of the TARDIS, and the TARDIS had looked into her, and it made sense just then that he would never truly travel alone.

"And what about you," he murmured, taking the hand that held his face and lifting it with his own to rest on her flushed cheek. "You trusted me, and all I managed to do was go and lose you,"

He was shocked when she blinked and what fell from her eyes were not tears of sorrow but of laughter. His face must have reflected his bewilderment because she smiled and pressed his hand tighter.

"Lose me? Doctor, you _found_ me."

"I'm so sorry," she whispered. "It's never been fair. I learned that from you, y' know. But you're brave, and you're good. My Doctor," she smiled, bending to kiss his forehead. "I think I knew, from the moment you grabbed my hand in Henrik's, that I would love you. No matter how many times you change your face. Because no matter what happens, long after I'm gone, you'll still be out there, changing the universe one stupid ape at a time."

He didn't think he could stand it, her face brilliant as the slick tears reflected the golden light of the Time Vortex so that she shone like a beacon above him. But the light came closer and he felt the intensity of that heat centered on her lips as they pressed gently against his and the song of the TARDIS swelled in glorious crescendo in his ears.

He felt the press of her cheek against his lighten and knew she must be sitting up again. But she wasn't; she was right next to him, but it was as if her weight had suddenly lessened by two stone, at least. She noticed — with more alarm than he allowed himself to show — that her skin was fading, growing increasingly transparent and that the light which had brought him to her, which even now haloed her body, was concentrated at her back.

"Should've known it was too good to last," he muttered, his voice tinged with the irony that seemed a constant variable in the equation of his life.

Real tears threatened to spill over her eyelashes as she sputtered, "But I wanted to stay, make sure you were safe. Until you changed, at least, or — ." She didn't finish the thought, instead shaking her head and murmuring, "Y' shouldn't be alone, not now."

"Never alone, remember?" he chided, but as Rose — his Rose! — became fainter and the tight grasp she had on his fingers faded to a light brush of skin against skin, he reached out to finger the blurry halo of her hair and looked her straight in the eyes.

"Not leaving before I tell you," he whispered, "but Rose Tyler…" A million words from every species he had ever encountered filled his head, but what came out was: "You are Time and all worlds to me."

The pressure of her hands on his faded away, and it was that absence and not the pain of every molecule of his being dying one by one that brought him to tears.

The console materialized around him as he regained consciousness, and as his eyes acclimated themselves to the pulsing blue light of the room, the Doctor focused on the swirling golden tendrils that emanated from his calloused fingers. As they spread, fluctuating and broadening to encompass his entire body, he no longer felt pain; the glow was a familiar embrace, and he could swear he heard it whispering to him, comforting the old as it become suddenly and wonderfully new.


End file.
